Sony Pictures to Offer Censored, ‘Clean Versions’ of Their Films

When you buy digital copies of certain Sony Pictures films, you'll also get censored versions that you'll never, ever watch.

Don’t you hate it when you’re watching a movie on an airplane or on network television, and they censor out all the naughty language, violence and sexual content?

Well, good news. Now you can OWN that version of the movie! The version that the filmmakers DIDN’T want you to see!

Sony Pictures has just announced (via Yahoo) that they will distribute “Clean Versions”of 24 of their popular – and not-so-popular – films. When you purchase the theatrical version of these movies from iTunes, VUDU, and FandangoNOW, you also will receive the “adapted for a wider audience” edition as a bonus feature.

The first wave of “Clean Versions” includes movies that were theoretically supposed to be for wide audiences in the first place, like Pixels and Goosebumps (which implies that Sony Pictures should have thought of these issues during production), as well as movies that are inherently about sex and violence anyway, like the teen sex comedy Easy A and the traumatic hijacking drama Captain Phillips (which are probably inappropriate for little kids, even after being censored).

Fortunately, these “Clean Versions” are merely supplemental materials at the moment, and not being offered INSTEAD of the versions that the talent has officially approved. Even so, “clean versions” have long been a point of contention for filmmakers, many of whom have asked their name to be taken off of the censored editions of their movies. Michael Mann is credited as “Alan Smithee” in the credits for the censored versions of his classic films Heat and The Insider, and David Lynch used the same (now discontinued) alias for the extended, censored versions of his sci-fi epic Dune.

Seth Rogen, who has produced multiple films for Sony Pictures including Sausage Party and The Interview, has already publicly spoken out against releasing these “Clean Versions”. The official comment from Seth Rogen’s Twitter was released early today, and reads as follows: “Holy shit please don’t do this to our movies. Thanks.”